WASHINGTON, USA — Two agencies officially announced Thursday their plans to restore a population of grizzly bears to the North Cascade Mountains.
The National Park Service (NPS) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife will seek to move three to seven grizzly bears a year over five to 10 years to establish an initial population of 25 grizzly bears. The animals will be translocated from ecosystems in the Rocky Mountains and Interior British Columbia, according to a press release.
Grizzly bears were native to the North Cascades for thousands of years but disappeared mostly due to hunting by humans. The last confirmed sighting of a grizzly bear in the U.S. portion of the North Cascades Mountains was in 1996. The North Cascades ecosystem is roughly 9,800 square miles, which is larger than the state of New Jersey, and home to some of the most intact wildlands in the contiguous U.S., according to the release.
The bears served as a key part of the North Cascades ecosystem, distributing native plant seeds and keeping other wildlife populations in balance, according to the NPS.
"We are going to once again see grizzly bears on the landscape, restoring an important thread in the fabric of the North Cascades," said Superintendent of the North Cascades National Park Service Complex Don Striker.
The process to restore the grizzly bear population was the subject of much public input, with 12,000 comments submitted on the NPS's draft environmental impact statement in 2023. The plans have been unpopular with people who live around the North Cascades National Park, including residents in Newhalem, and farther east into Central Washington.
There is no set timeline for when the translocation of grizzly bears to the North Cascades ecosystem will begin. The NPS will provide updates to the public as plans develop.